“MIL GRACIAS a todos aquellos que festejaron el triunfo de la justicia y de mi libertad,” says a post on Asch’s Facebook wall. “MANY THANKS to all that celebrated the triumph of justice and my freedom.”

The U.S. Attorney’s office is trying to get details from Mexican authorities, but doesn’t expect the latest turn of events to cause problems.

“Assuming these reports are correct, we don’t expect his release to have an impact on the extradition proceedings in Mexico,” said Thom Mrozek, spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s Officein Los Angeles.

Asch was arrested in Mexico City in November by Mexican authorities, and held as a fugitive on anInterpol “red notice.” Mexico contacted American authorities, who asked that Asch be detained while the U.S. prepared its formal extradition request. That request was made in January.

The terms of Asch’s release are a bit murky. American authorities are trying to figure out if he posted bond, and where he actually is. If Asch was allowed to leave Mexico, it would be much harder to bring him back to the U.S. to face criminal charges he skipped out on 13 years ago.

It’s not the first time the U.S. has tried to bring Asch back to American shores. It sought, unsuccessfully, his extradition from Argentina in 2004.

THE SCANDAL

When the fertility scandal broke in 1995, it was a space-age dilemma. Asch and his colleagues were accused of taking women’s eggs without their permission, and giving them to other women — who later bore children from those eggs.

At least 15 live births resulted from improper transfers at the clinic, which was shuttered after UCI whistleblowers brought the egg-theft scandal to the attention of UC officials and The Orange Country Register in 1995.

Stealing human tissue was not a crime at the time, but auditors from KPMG Peat Marwick found that nearly $1 million in income at the clinic had not been reported, including tens of thousands of dollars of patients’ cash payments allegedly pocketed by the doctors.

Asch and colleagues Jose Balmaceda and Sergio Stone were indicted by a federal grand jury on multiple charges of mail fraud and income-tax evasion. Asch and Balmaceda fled the country – Asch to Mexico and Argentina, and Balmaceda to Chile. Stone was convicted in 1997 of fraudulently billing insurance companies and fined $50,000.

The devastation felt by patients who were struggling to have children — and who learned, years later, that they had biological children, but born to someone else – was unprecedented in both legal, ethical and medical terms. Patients filed more than 150 lawsuits related to the scandal, and the university has paid out more than $27 million in settlements.

Some families at the end of the transaction agreed to furnish photos of the children to those who provided the genetic material that helped make them. The threat of ugly custody lawsuits loomed – what are the parental rights of the people who give birth to a child and raise him? What are the parental rights of those who provide the genetic material for that child, against their wishes and without their knowledge and consent? – but those custody cases never came to pass. Even those heartsick upon learning that someone else was raising their biological children ultimately thought it was in the childrens’ best interest to stay in the only homes they had ever known, with the only parents they had ever known.

Last year, Asch attorney Eliel Chemerinski argued that the indictment against Asch should be dropped, because an Argentinian court tried and acquitted him on the charges. Continuing to press the issue in the U.S. amounts to double jeopardy, Chemerinski argued.

Sforza birthed the Watchdog column for The Orange County Register in 2008, aiming to keep a critical (but good-humored) eye on governments and nonprofits, large and small. It won first place for public service reporting from the California Newspaper Publishers Association in 2010. Sforza contributed to the OCR's Pulitzer Prize-winning investigation of fertility fraud at UC Irvine, covered what was then the largest municipal bankruptcy in America‘s history, and is the author of "The Strangest Song," the first book to tell the story of a genetic condition called Williams syndrome and the extraordinary musicality of many of the people who have it. She earned her M.F.A. from UCLA's School of Theater, Film and Television, and enjoys making documentaries, including the OCR's first: "The Boy Monk," a story that was also told as a series in print. Watchdogs need help: Point us to documents that can help tell stories that need to be told, and we'll do the rest. Send tips to watchdog@ocregister.com.

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